Letter to the Editor: I-502 is Poison Pill Politics

To the editor:

The Federal Government has its own medical marijuana program, grown at the University of Mississippi. They send out tin cans filled with joints and these patients are legal to smoke anywhere in the United States, even in places like Texas. The Federal Government also passed medical cannabis laws for D.C.

They are trying to impose a Federal monopoly through granting special licenses for corporate cannabis. It is up to the states to end this.

Unfortunately, I-502 does not help this because it leaves cannabis on schedule one at the state level.

It is poison pill politics and must be defeated. Legalization does not require locking away kids, patients and others while keeping the plant illegal to grow personally.

Medical patients and other grassroots level cannabis activists have been fighting hard to get real legalization on the ballots here in WA state for years and have been blocked by large corporations and law enforcement lobbyists, mostly with out of state money.

They know legalization is coming, so they offer I-502 which PROTECTS law enforcement interests FIRST.

If you want a business under this scheme, you will have to turn over your information and fingerprints to the FBI in order to get your license to grow, process or sell cannabis. The state takes none of the risk and will not help you if charged with cannabis crimes under Federal Law, even if you abide strictly to all state laws and regulations.

As for the 5 nanogram standard, it has been rejected by the Colorado legislature as unscientific and unworkable. Even Germany had the intelligence to exempt patients from their per se DUID laws.

An 8 nanogram standard was proposed in Washington State not long back. It was quickly rejected and removed for consideration based on public backlash and lack of scientific evidence to support it.

Legalization is coming, but it needs to be done in ways that reduce the chances of good people getting arrested. We don't need more people having their lives ruined all because they believed we legalized cannabis when that won't be the reality, just like what happened with our medical cannabis laws in this state.

It makes for great debate and headlines, but the cost will be on the backs of the poor and most vulnerable people in our society when they do not have adequate legal protections and are forced to use overburdened and under funded Public Defenders who work harder towards making plea deals than they do trying to win in trials.

Please vote NO on I-502

John Novak 
Lake Forest Park